


The Literary Canon

by neveralarch



Category: Dream Daddy: A Dad Dating Simulator
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-02-20 02:51:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13137549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neveralarch/pseuds/neveralarch
Summary: Ernest and Lucien reenact the classics, despite Hugo's protests.





	The Literary Canon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [formerlydf](https://archiveofourown.org/users/formerlydf/gifts).



> Happy yuletide formerlydf! This was a treat that got a little out of hand :)
> 
> This fic contains a lot of bad teenage decisions, but no actual character injury. Please let me know if you need details.

_9th grade_

Hugo takes off his glasses, cleans them, puts them back on. It’s still his son sitting in front of him. "Ernest, why are you here?"

Ernest shrugs. Lucien, sitting next to him in the front row, is quick to answer on his behalf. "He's part of my presentation, Mr. Vega."

Hugo doesn't shift his attention from the child that he is actually raising. "Aren't you supposed to be in class?"

"It's my free period," mumbles Ernest.

"Aren't you supposed to be in the _middle school_?" persists Hugo.

"It's, like, three blocks away," says Ernest. "I can walk."

"I just need him for five minutes." Lucien shuffles his notes. "Hey, can we use your desk?"

Hugo has made many sacrifices for his students. This is not one of them. "No."

After some muttering, Ernest and Hugo get three chairs from the front row and line them up facing the class. Ernest lies awkwardly across the half-desks bolted to the chairs, his arms flopping toward the floor and his tongue hanging out of his mouth.

Lucien clears his throat. "This is my report. By me, Lucien Bloodmarch.”

“Dude, is that really your last name?” whispers Ernest.

“Shut up, you’re dead,” hisses Lucien.

“Lucien,” says Hugo, because this is basically his only rule, “how would you like to rephrase that?”

Lucien hesitates. “Be… quiet? Dear Ernest?”

Hugo nods, and Lucien straightens his back and puts out a hand in his patented presentation stance. He’s been working on it since at least 6th grade.

“Anyway, pay no attention to the corpse. In _Frankenstein_ , Mary Shelley begins with the fantastical idea that large surges of electricity can bring the dead back to life. This prognosticates the use of defibrillator machines, but taken to an unrealistic extreme. As my assistant will demonstrate, large amounts of electricity have the opposite effect on the human body. Hold on, let me get the extension cord—Ernest, have you got the fork?"

"No!" shouts Hugo. “No electrocuting in class!”

Lucien looks thoughtful. “Maybe if I _rephrase_ —”

“No!”

\---

_10th grade_

"Just as a reminder," says Hugo, "there will be no show and tell as part of the presentation. I don't want a repeat of last year, right? Yes, Lucien."

"Powerpoint is still okay, right?"

"Powerpoint is fine." Hugo looks suspiciously at unusually-eager Lucien. "Would you like to go first?"

Lucien practically bounces out of his seat and plugs a flash drive into the classroom desktop. "Hi guys, I’m Lucien Bloodmarch. My presentation is on Miss Havisham from Great Expectations." He clicks to the first slide. "Miss Havisham is a key figure in the moral drama of Dickens' famous text. Ruined by a lack of love, Miss Havisham lives alone in a mausoleum of wealth—"

The ‘mausoleum of wealth’ is a dusty room full of boxes. A familiar dusty room full of boxes. "Is that," says Hugo, “that’s my attic!”

"—draped in the memories of her youth."

The white-wrapped figure is significantly shorter than might be expected. The face is a shadowed in the dim attic, but the messy hair looks familiar.

"That's—that's my son!"

"When Miss Havisham confesses to Pip, the trappings of her lost love literally burn around her—"

Hugo almost knocks over the chair as he stands up. "Is that what happened to Ernest's eyebrows? He told me it was an accident in chemistry lab!"

"Don't worry, Mr. Vega." Lucien clicks to the next slide, which shows the nozzle of a fire extinguisher dousing Ernest in white foam. "Pip, still fueled by his young love for Estella, rescues Miss Havisham—"

One of the kids raises her hand. "Doesn't Miss Havisham, like, die of her wounds?"

Lucien clicks to the next slide. Ernest, wrapped in a singed white sheet, is lying on the attic floor. His eyes are closed. His tongue is sticking out.

"Ooh," says the class.

"No!" says Hugo.

\---

_11th grade_

Hugo is much happier now that they don't do in-class presentations. Discussions rarely descend into electrocution or setting each other on fire. Sure, the kids don't get the opportunity to stutter their way through an awkwardly-written three-paragraph essay, but the skills of reasoned discussion and debate are equally valuable.

Hugo sits in the teacher’s lounge, sipping his coffee, and relishes another day without in-class presentations. Ahh.

One of the new math teachers walks by with tea, then doubles back. "Hey, Mr. Vega, right? I love your kid's videos."

Hugo chokes on his coffee.

"They're really cool!" says Mrs. Schmidt. "Do you supervise?"

"No," says Hugo. "No. If it's not at school, I don't need to know about it."

"Really?" Mrs. Schmidt looks a little uneasy. "Because those swords looked kind of sharp—"

Ernest doesn’t have any social media accounts yet. With a sinking feeling, Hugo pulls up Lucien's youtube profile on his phone. There it is— **Three Musketeers Book Review Reenactment Swords Blood Awesome Death Battle**.

"No one actually dies, right?" asks Hugo.

"Uh—"

"Is the blood fake?" pleads Hugo.

"I think I have class in a minute," says Mrs. Schmidt, backing away.

Hugo calls his son. 

"I'm kind of busy," says Ernest.

"It's lunch period," says Hugo. "Look, just tell me—tell me you're being safe."

" _Gross_ ," says Ernest.

"Not like that!" Hugo rubs at his forehead. "I mean, tell me you're not letting Lucien practice literary murder techniques on you every week for his youtube show."

Ernest doesn't say anything. In the silence, Hugo can hear the thudding of bricks hitting bricks.

"Where are you?" he asks.

"It's not a big deal," says Ernest.

"Where are you?"

"I'm almost definitely not going to be bricked up and die!" says Ernest.

"I'm calling the principal." Hugo's already on his feet, stalking down the corridors to the stairs. "I'm finding you, then calling the principal."

"I'm just trying to engage with literature!" whines Ernest.

"Yeah, Mr. Vega!" calls Lucien, voice tinny over the connection. "We're _learning_!"

Hugo needs to rewrite his syllabus. From now on, the only books he's assigning will be nice books about young men who work hard and have nothing bad happen to them ever. Books like... Robinson Crusoe? No. Catcher in the Rye? Definitely not. Cannery Row? ...Maybe.

"The problem is the literary canon," Hugo mutters to himself. "Or something about masculinity. Or social media culture. Or—" With a sinking feeling, Hugo realizes the truth. “The problem is active learning pedagogy techniques!”


End file.
